ACT I. SCEN E I.

On à Ship at Sea. A tempestuous noise of thunder and lightning beard :

Enter a Ship-master, and a Boatswain.

MASTER.. MASIV Oatswain.

Boats. Here, Master : what cheer ?

Mast. Good, speak to th’mariners : fali

to't yarely, or we run our selves a-ground; eerder bestir, bestir.

[Exit. Enter Mariners. Boats. Hey, my hearts ; cheerly, my hearts; yare, yare; take in the top-fail ; tend to th' master's whistle ; blow, 'till thou burst thy wind, if room enough."

Enter 1 The Tempeft.] These two first Plays, the Tempest and the Midsummer-night's Dream, are the nobleft Efforts of that sublime and amazing Imagination, peculiar to. Shakespear, which soars above the Bounds of Nature without forsaking Sense: or, more properly, carries Nature along with him beyond her established Limits. Fletcher seems particularly to have admired these two B 2

Plays,

Enter Alonso, Sebastian, Anthonio, Ferdinand,

Gonzalo, and others. Alon. Good Boatswain, have care: where's the master ? play the men.

Boats. I pray now, keep below.
Ant. Where is the master, boatswain ?

Boats. Do you not hear him? you mar our labour ; keep your cabins; you do assist the storm, Gonz. Nay, good, be patient.

Boats. When the sea is. Hence- what care these Roarers for the name of King? to cabin ; silence ; trouble us not.

Gonz. Good, yet remember whom thou hast aboard.

Boats. None, that I more love than my self. You are a counsellor ; if you can command these elements to silence, and work the peace o’the present, we will not hand a rope more ; use your" authority. If you cannot, give thanks you have liv'd so long, and make your self ready in your cabin for the mischance of the hour, if it so hap. Cheerly, good hearts: out of our way, I say.

[Exit. Gonz. 'I have great comfort from this fellow; methinks, he hath no drowning mark upon him; his complexion is perfect gallows. Stand fast, good fate, to his hanging; make the rope of his destiny our cable, for our own doth little advantage : if he be not born to be hang’d, our case is miserable. [Exeunt.

Plays, and hath wrote two in Imitation of them, the Sea-voyage and the Faithful Shepherdess. But when he presumes to break a Lance with Shakespear, and write in emulation of him, as he does in the False one, which is the Rival of Anthony and Cleopatra, he is not so successful. After him, Sir John Suckling and Milton catched the brightest Fire of their Imagination from these two Plays; which shines fantastically indeed, in the Goblins, but much more nobly and serenely in The Mask at Ludlow.Cafile.

Re-enter Re-enter Boatswain. · Boats. Down with the top-mast: yare, lower, lower ; bring her to try with main-course. A plague upon this howling! A cry within. Re-enter Sebastian, Anthonio, and

Gonzalo. they are louder than the weather, or our office. Yet again? what do you here? shall we give o'er, and drown? have you a mind to sink?

Seb. A pox o’your throat, you bawling, blafphemous, uncharitable dog.

Boats. Work you then.

Ant. Hang, cur, hang; you whoreson, insolent, noisemaker ; we are less afraid to be drown'd than thou art.

Gonz. I'll warrant him from drowning, tho' the ship were no stronger than a nut-shell, and as leaky as an unstanch'd wench.

Boats. Lay her a-hold, a-hold; set her two courses off to sea again, lay her off.

Enter Mariners wet. Mar. All lost ! to prayers ! to prayers ! all lost! (Exe. Boats. What, must our mouths be cold ?

Gonz. The King and Prince at pray’rs! let us affist 'em. For our case is as theirs. Seb. I'm out of patience.

kards. . Ant. We're meerly cheated of our lives by drunThis wide-chopt rascal- 'Would, thou might'st lye

drowning,
The washing of ten tides ! .

Gonz, He'll be hang'd yet,
Though every drop of water swear against it,
And gape at wid'it to glut him.

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A confused noise within.] Mercy on us !
We split, we split! Farewel, my Wife and Children!
Brother, farewel! we split, we split, we split !
Ant. Let's all sink with the King.

[Exit. Seb. Let's take leave of him.

Exit. Gonz. Now would I give a thousand furlongs of fea for an acre of barren ground, 2 long heath, brown furze, any thing; the wills above be done, but I would fain die a dry death!

[Exit.

S C Ε Ν Ε ΙΙ. Changes to a Part of the Inchanted Island near the

Cell of Prospero.

Enter Profpero and Miranda. Mira. ' T F by your art (my dearest father)-you

.. I have Put the wild Waters in this roar, allay them : . The sky, it seems, would pour down stinking pitch, But that the sea, mounting to thwelkin's cheek, Dalhes the fire out. O! I have suffer'd With those that I saw suffer: a brave vessel (Who had, no doubt, some noble creatures in her) Dash'd all to pieces. O the cry did knock Against my very heart: poor souls, they perish'd! Had I been any God of Pow'r, I would Have sunk the sea within the earth ; or ere It should the good ship so have swallow'd, and The fraighting souls within her. '. 2 - long heatb, ] This is the common name for the erica baccifera ; which the Oxford Editor not understanding, conjectured that Shakespear wrote, – Ling, Heath : But, unluckily, Heath and Ling are but two words for the same plant.

3 If by your Art, &c.] Nothing was ever better contrived to inform the Audience of the Story than this Scene. It is a conversation that could not have happened before, and could not but happen now.

Pro.

It should in the sea within low'r, I worthy perish’d!

Pro. Be collected;
No more amazement; tell your piteous heart,
There's no harm done,

Mira. Owo the day!

Pro. No harm.
I have done nothing but in care of thee,
(Of thee my dear one, thee my daughter) who
Art ignorant of what thou art, nought knowing
Of whence I am ; nor that I am more better
Than Prospero, master of a full-poor cell,
And thy no greater father.

Mira. More to know
Did never meddle with my thoughts,

Pro. 'Tis time,
I should inform thee farther. Lend thy hand,
And pluck my magick garment from me: fo!

[Lays down bis mantle. Lye there my Art. Wipe thou thine eyes, have

comfort.
The direful spectacle of the wreck, which touch'd
4 The very virtue of compassion in thee,
I have with such provision in mine art
So safely order'd, that there's no soul loft,
No, not so much perdition as an hair,
Betid to any creature in the vessel
Which thou heard'ft cry, which thou sawift sink: sit
For thou must now know farther.

Mira. You have often
Begun to tell me what I am, but stopt,

4 The very Virtue of compassion in thee, ] We must not think that the very Virtue was intended to Thew the degree of her com: paflion, but the kind. Compassion for other's Misfortunes offeneft arises from a sense or apprehension of the like. And then it is Sympathy, not Virtue. Tho' the want of it may be esteemed vicious as arising from a degeneracy of Nature, which cannot happen but by our own fault. Now the Compasion of Miranda, who never ventured to Sea, not being of this kind, Shakespear with great pro. priety calls it the very Virtue, i.e. the real pure Virtue of Com. pallon.

And

down ;

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